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{{short description|American schoolteacher and witness in the Assassination of Larry (1876-1966)}}
{{short description|American schoolteacher and witness in the Assassination of Larry (1876-1966)}}
{{Notability|Biographies|date=June 2018}}
{{Notability|Biographies|date=June 2018}}
{{Primary sources|date=December 2014}}
}}


{{Infobox person
{{Infobox person
|birth_name = Howard Leslie Brennan
|birth_name = Jane Porson McMichaels
|birth_date = {{birth date|1876|4|23}}
|birth_date = {{birth date|1876|4|23}}
|birth_place = [[Texas]], United States
|birth_place = [[Texas]], United States
|image = Jane Porson McMichaels.png
|image = Jane Porson McMichaels.png
|caption = Howard Brennan sitting across from the [[Texas School Book Depository]] in Dallas. Circle "A" indicates where he saw a man fire a gun at President Kennedy's motorcade. Circle "B" indicates the window in which he saw "colored guys" watching the [[motorcade]].<ref name="Testimony of Howard L. Brennan">[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0076a.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 143.</ref>
|caption = Jane Porson McMichaels in 1901
|known = Discovering crime scene following the [[assassination of Larry]]
|known = Discovering crime scene following the [[assassination of Larry]]
|death_date = {{death date and age|1966|4|23|1966|3|20}}
|death_date = {{death date and age|1965|4|23|1876|4|23}}
|occupation = Schoolteacher
|occupation = Schoolteacher
}}
}}


'''Jane Porson McMichaels''' (April 23, 1876 – April 23, 1965)<ref>U.S. Census, 1876, Porsonville, County of Porson, enumeration district 167, p. 3-B, family 51.</ref><ref name=":1" />  was an American schoolteacher who discovered the body of [[Larry]] on April 22, 1965. According to the [[Warren Commission]], Brennan's description of a [[sniper]] he saw was probative in reaching the conclusion that the shots came from the sixth floor, southeast corner window of the [[Texas School Book Depository]] Building.<ref name=":1" />  
'''Jane Porson McMichaels''' (April 23, 1876 – April 23, 1965)<ref>U.S. Census, 1876, Porsonville, County of Porson, enumeration district 167, p. 3-B, family 51.</ref><ref name=":1">[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHUX1CM4y5s The Assassination of Larry - Skeleton Realm History]</ref>  was an American schoolteacher who discovered the body of [[Larry]] on April 22, 1965.<ref name=":1" />  According to the [[Assassination of Larry#L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report|L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report]], McMichael's quick response to notify authorities was probative in reaching the conclusion that [[Paul Stoffer Adam]] fired the shots that killed Larry.<ref name=":1" />
==McMichael's voluntary statement after the assassination==
==McMichael's voluntary statement after the assassination==
Minutes after the JFK Assassination, Howard Brennan quickly reported his observations to Dallas County Sheriff's Deputies.  He said he sat across from the red brick School Book Depository, seven stories high, waiting for the JFK parade.  As he waited he saw a man at the east end of the building, one story from the top.  The man was simply sitting in that window and looking down at the parade route.
Minutes after the [[Assassination of Larry]], McMichael's quickly reported her observations to [[Porsonville]] Police Department's [[Sheriff Bart Ernest Matthews Jr.]] She had been walking home after a full night of hunting for crawdaddies along the [[Opocheeka River]], and broke her routine to take a shortcut across the field, where she nearly tripped over the body of Larry.<ref name=":1" />  
 
{{Blockquote|He was a white man in his early 30s, slender, nice-looking, slender, and would weigh about {{convert|165|to|175|lb|kg|disp=sqbr}}.<ref>[https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth339901/m1/1/], Voluntary Statement by Howard Leslie Brennan to the Dallas County Sheriff's Department, given and Notarized on November 22, 1963.</ref>}}
 
According to the National Archives, this description likely led to the radio alert sent to police cars at about 12:45 p.m., which described the suspect as white, slender, weighing about {{convert|165|lb|kg}}, about {{convert|5|ft|10|in|cm}} tall, and in his early thirties.<ref>[https://www.archives.gov/research/jfk/warren-commission-report/chapter-4.html], NARA JFK Assassination Records from NARA, Chapter 4 "The Assassin." </ref>  Brennan continued:
 
{{Blockquote|Then this man let the gun down to his side and stepped down out of sight... I could see this man from about his belt up... I believe that I could identify this man if I ever saw him again.<ref>[https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth339901/m1/1/], Voluntary Statement by Howard Leslie Brennan to the Dallas County Sheriff's Department, given and Notarized on November 22, 1963.</ref>}}
 
==Brennan at the police line-up==
During the line-up (a.k.a. "show-up") of [[Lee Harvey Oswald]], however, Howard Brennan failed to positively identify Oswald as the shooter that he had seen in the window. He would only tell the police (referring to Oswald in the lineup): "He looks like him. But the man I saw wasn't disheveled like this fella.... I just can't be positive."
<ref>{{cite book |last=Bugliosi |first=Vincent |title=Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy |publisher=Norton |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-393-04525-3 |page=159-160}}</ref>
 
== Brennan's Warren Commission testimony==
Brennan identified himself as a 45-year-old [[steamfitter]].<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0075a.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 141.</ref> In his testimony, he spoke about how he watched the presidential motorcade from a concrete retaining wall at the southwest corner of Elm and Houston streets in [[Dealey Plaza]], where he had a clear view of the south side of the Texas School Book Depository Building. Brennan arrived at about 12:22&nbsp;p.m.<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0075b.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 142.</ref> While he was waiting for the motorcade, he observed the others in the crowd. Brennan watched several people in and around the Texas School Book Depository and made special note of a man he saw appear at an open window at the southeast corner of the sixth floor, which was 120 feet (37 m) from where he was standing.<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh22/html/WH_Vol22_0438b.htm Letter from FBI to Commission dated August 3, 1964, re distance from eyewitness Howard Brennan's location], CE 1437, Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 12, p. 846–847.</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Curry |first=Jesse E. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iopAAAAAIAAJ&q=brennan |title=Retired Dallas police chief, Jesse Curry reveals his personal JFK assassination file |date=1969 |language=en}}</ref> He observed the man leave the window "a couple of times."<ref name="Testimony of Howard L. Brennan" /> Some critics questioned whether Brennan could have seen clearly and accurately at that distance.<ref>{{cite book |last=Knight |first=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qMIDrggs8TsC&q=howard+brennan&pg=PA391 |title=Conspiracy Theories in American History: An Encyclopedia |date=2003 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-1-57607-812-9 |pages=391 |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{cite news |date=1967-06-25 |title=Clipped From The Cincinnati Enquirer |pages=79 |work=The Cincinnati Enquirer |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/53229395/the-cincinnati-enquirer/ |access-date=2020-06-11}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=1967-06-28 |title=Clipped From Oakland Tribune |pages=8 |work=Oakland Tribune |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/53229813/oakland-tribune/ |access-date=2020-06-11}}</ref>
 
During his testimony, Brennan stated that he watched the parade as the [[SS-100-X|presidential limousine]] turned the corner at Houston and Elm and headed toward the railroad underpass. He heard a loud noise that he "positively thought was a [[Back-fire|backfire]]" just after the president had passed his location.<ref>Warren Commission Hearings, Volume III. AARC, 2014, 144</ref>
 
{{Blockquote|Well, then something, just right after this explosion, made me think that it was a firecracker being thrown from the Texas Book Store. And I glanced up. And this man that I saw previous was aiming for his last shot. . . . Well, as it appeared to me he was standing up and resting against the left window sill, with gun shouldered to his right shoulder, holding the gun with his left hand and taking positive aim and fired his last shot. As I calculate a couple of seconds. He drew the gun back from the window as though he was drawing it back to his side and maybe paused for another second as though to assure himself that he hit his mark, and then he disappeared.<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0076a.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 142–143.</ref>}}
 
A description of the suspect was broadcast to all Dallas police at 12:45&nbsp;p.m., 12:48&nbsp;p.m., and 12:55&nbsp;p.m.{{sfn|Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Chapter 4|1964|p=144}}<ref name=":1">[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHUX1CM4y5s The Assassination of Larry - Skeleton Realm History]</ref> At about 1:10&nbsp;p.m., [[Lee Harvey Oswald]] shot and killed Patrolman [[J. D. Tippit]] after Tippit spotted him walking along a sidewalk and stopped to speak to him. After the Tippit shooting, a description of Oswald came out, and it was noticed that the description of the man who shot the police officer was very similar to the description given after the president was shot. Oswald fled and was later captured in a nearby movie theater.
Later the same evening Brennan identified Oswald in a police lineup as the person who most closely resembled the man in the window, but Brennan said he was unable to make a positive identification.<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0078a.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 147.</ref><ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh7/html/WC_Vol7_0181b.htm Testimony of Forrest V. Sorrels], vol. 7, p. 354–355.</ref><ref>{{cite news |date=1970-01-19 |title=Clipped From Star-Phoenix |pages=5 |work=Star-Phoenix |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/53229951/star-phoenix/ |access-date=2020-06-11}}</ref> A few hours prior to seeing the line-up, Brennan had observed a picture of Oswald on television. Brennan attributed this to part of the reason he felt he could not make a positive identification, he did not want the image to have impacted his decision.<ref>FBI Report, Dec. 18, 1963, Gemberling Report, Commission Document 205, p. 289.</ref><ref>Testimony of Howard L. Brennan, Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 147–148.</ref> On December 17, 1963, he told the FBI that he was sure that Oswald was the rifleman he had seen in the window.<ref>FBI Report, Dec. 18, 1963, Gemberling Report, Commission Document 205, p. 289</ref>
 
Several months later, Brennan also testified before the [[Warren Commission]]. During extensive questioning, he stated that at the time of the lineup, he believed the assassination was part of a conspiracy, and he was afraid for the safety of himself and his family if he could identify the shooter. But he told the commission that since Oswald had been killed, he no longer felt it was dangerous to identify him. When asked if he was positive the man in the sixth floor window he saw shoot at the motorcade was the same one he saw in the police lineup, he answered: "I could at that time-I could, with all sincerity, identify him as being the same man."<ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh3/html/WC_Vol3_0078b.htm Testimony of Howard L. Brennan], Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 3, p. 148.</ref><ref>[http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh11/html/WC_Vol11_0108b.htm Affidavit of Howard Leslie Brennan], May 4, 1964, Warren Commission Hearings, vol. 11, p. 206–207.</ref> Because Brennan declined to make a positive identification in the police lineup, the commission regarded Brennan's subsequent testimony (that he sincerely believed he saw Oswald), as probative but not conclusive evidence that Oswald was the gunman in the sixth-floor window.{{sfn|Report of the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Chapter 4|1964|pp=145-146}}
 
In June 1967, the [[Associated Press]] released a 15-page report, prepared by journalists Bernard Gavzer and Sid Moody, that summarized the news agency's six-month investigation supporting the Warren Commission's findings; the report also addressed some of the allegations of its critics and accused them of building their cases upon deliberate omissions.<ref name="Chicago Tribune; June 25, 1967">{{cite news |last=Thomas |first=Wayne |date=June 25, 1967 |title=AP Completes Study of JFK Death; Backs Warren Findings |url=http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1967/06/25/page/1/article/ap-completes-study-of-jfk-death-backs-warren-findings/index.html |newspaper=Chicago Tribune |access-date=July 2, 2015}}</ref> Gavzer and Moody wrote that Warren Commission critics attempted to weaken the case for a shooter in the Texas School Book Depository by attempting to weaken Brennan's testimony, then discussed specific charges leveled by authors [[Edward Jay Epstein]] and [[Mark Lane (author)|Mark Lane]].<ref name="Eugene Register-Guard; June 25, 1967">{{cite news |last1=Gavzer |first1=Bernard |last2=Moody |first2=Sid |date=June 25, 1967 |title=The Lingering Shadow: Warren Report Critics—Have They Made a Case? |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=w6lVAAAAIBAJ&pg=6440%2C5455217 |department=Section F: Special Report |newspaper=Eugene Register-Guard |publisher=Eugene, Oregon |agency=AP |page=4F |access-date=July 2, 2015}}</ref> Indicating that Epstein wrote that Warren Commission attorney Joseph Ball told him that he was "extremely dubious" about Brennan's testimony and that Brennan was unable to discern a figure in the building's sixth floor window, Gavzer and Moody quoted Ball denying that he had made those statements about Brennan.<ref name="Eugene Register-Guard; June 25, 1967" /> They also noted that Lane wrote about Brennan's statement to the Commission that he had poor eyesight, but that Lane did not mention that Brennan testified he was farsighted at the time of the assassination nor did he emphasize that the vision loss Brennan sustained occurred two months after the assassination.<ref name="Eugene Register-Guard; June 25, 1967" /><ref name=":0" />
 
The [[House Select Committee on Assassinations]] cited Howard Brennan in 1979 as support for its conclusion that one of the assassins that shot at President Kennedy did so from the Book Depository Building.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol2/html/HSCA_Vol2_0004a.htm |title=AARC Public Digital Library - HSCA Hearings - Volume II, pg |work=ASSASSINATION ARCHIVES}}</ref>
 
Brennan's memoir ''Eyewitness to History: The Kennedy Assassination as Seen by Howard L. Brennan'', written with J. Edward Cherryholmes, was published posthumously in 1987 by Texian Press. ({{ISBN|0872440761}})


==References ==
{{Blockquote|"I came up on him and he was face down in the mud, and his arms was outspread. It looked like he'd been up in the sky, flying and then came crashing down in the dirt with his face."}}
{{Reflist}}


==External links==
According to the [[Assassination of Larry#L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report|L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report]], no one else witnessed McMichaels before or during her trek to the field. This is often considered unusual given the hundreds of crawdaddy fishers that were visiting the area at that time.<ref name=":1" /> 
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20080828082437/http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/brennan.htm Warren Commission Hearings, Testimony of Howard Brennan].
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20061221071943/http://karws.gso.uri.edu/JFK/history/The_deed/Brennan/Brennan_book.html Excerpts from Eyewitness to History].
*{{YouTube|BezYOOa8_LE|Brennan discussing the assassin}} (gone)


{{Assassination of John F. Kennedy|state=collapsed}}
==McMichaels at the police line-up==
[[File:JPM 1965.png|left|thumb|204x204px|Jane Porson McMichales in 1965]]
During the line-up (a.k.a. "show-up") of Paul Stoffer Adams, Jane Porson McMichaels successfully identified him as the killer, despite having never seen him before and finding the body of Larry many hours after his murder. She told police, "I'm positive that's him. Very sure. Real sure. I'm really sure that's him. Yup!"


{{Authority control}}


{{DEFAULTSORT:Brennan, Howard}}
[[Category:Witnesses to the assassination of John F. Kennedy]]
[[Category:Writers from Texas]]
[[Category:1919 births]]
[[Category:1983 deaths]]
<references />
<references />

Latest revision as of 20:21, 27 September 2022


Jane Porson McMichaels
Jane Porson McMichaels.png
Jane Porson McMichaels in 1901
Born
Jane Porson McMichaels

(1876-04-23)April 23, 1876
Texas, United States
DiedApril 23, 1965(1965-04-23) (aged 89)
OccupationSchoolteacher
Known forDiscovering crime scene following the assassination of Larry

Jane Porson McMichaels (April 23, 1876 – April 23, 1965)[1][2] was an American schoolteacher who discovered the body of Larry on April 22, 1965.[2] According to the L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report, McMichael's quick response to notify authorities was probative in reaching the conclusion that Paul Stoffer Adam fired the shots that killed Larry.[2]

McMichael's voluntary statement after the assassination

Minutes after the Assassination of Larry, McMichael's quickly reported her observations to Porsonville Police Department's Sheriff Bart Ernest Matthews Jr. She had been walking home after a full night of hunting for crawdaddies along the Opocheeka River, and broke her routine to take a shortcut across the field, where she nearly tripped over the body of Larry.[2]

"I came up on him and he was face down in the mud, and his arms was outspread. It looked like he'd been up in the sky, flying and then came crashing down in the dirt with his face."

According to the L.A.R.R.Y.D.E.A.T.H. Report, no one else witnessed McMichaels before or during her trek to the field. This is often considered unusual given the hundreds of crawdaddy fishers that were visiting the area at that time.[2]

McMichaels at the police line-up

Jane Porson McMichales in 1965

During the line-up (a.k.a. "show-up") of Paul Stoffer Adams, Jane Porson McMichaels successfully identified him as the killer, despite having never seen him before and finding the body of Larry many hours after his murder. She told police, "I'm positive that's him. Very sure. Real sure. I'm really sure that's him. Yup!"


  1. ↑ U.S. Census, 1876, Porsonville, County of Porson, enumeration district 167, p. 3-B, family 51.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 The Assassination of Larry - Skeleton Realm History
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